Articles and Resources

QUOTE: Andrea Sloan is dying of ovarian cancer. Having exhausted all standard treatment options, her doctors say her best hope now is a new class of cancer drugs called PARP inhibitors....But she's not getting the treatment because the company is refusing to give it to her. That's because this drug she wants is still in clinical trials, and the company says hasn't been proven effective.

QUOTE: Just 5 percent of patients learn about the price of prescribed drugs during the doctor visit, according to a survey by the Consumer Reports National Research Center. But many expensive brand-name medications have equally effective counterparts that cost far less.

QUOTE: as patients and their doctors try to make critical decisions about serious illnesses, they may be getting worthless information that is based on bad science. The scientific world is concerned enough that two prominent groups, the National Cancer Institute and the Institute of Medicine, have begun examining the Duke case; they hope to find new ways to evaluate claims based on emerging and complex analyses of patterns of genes and other molecules.

QUOTE: The justices in a 5-4 ruling said generic drug companies do not share the same level of responsibility as makers of brand-name equivalents, to update their warning labels when significant new risks emerge.

QUOTE: [The FDA] is considering further actions against McNeil Consumer Healthcare, the Johnson & Johnson unit, after a pattern of violations in manufacturing and quality control practices led to a number of recent recalls...

QUOTE: As large as the penalties are for drug companies caught breaking the off-label law, the fines are tiny compared with the firms' annual revenue. The $2.3 billion in fines and penalties Pfizer paid for marketing Bextra and three other drugs cited in the Sept. 2 plea agreement for off-label uses amount to just 14 percent of its $16.8 billion in revenue from selling those medicines from 2001 to 2008.

QUOTE: Heightened efforts by the Drug Enforcement Administration to crack down on narcotics abuse are producing a troubling side effect by denying some hospice and elderly patients needed pain medication...

QUOTE: Unlike vaccines or prescription or over-the-counter drugs, homeopathic medicines, which account for annual U.S. sales of more than $200 million, do not need to demonstrate safety or effectiveness...

QUOTE: Those engaged in the experiment [by selling marijuana] here [now legal in New Mexico] never know if they will be arrested, because growing, selling and using marijuana remain illegal under federal law. And robbery is always a fear.

QUOTE: The US policy for which groups should be the first to receive influenza vaccines is not the most effective strategy to limit the spread of swine flu, according to a paper published online today in Science.

QUOTE: [activists] say the problem may lie in the administration's reluctance to confront the giant pharmaceutical companies at a time when the companies are crucial allies in President Obama's struggle to revamp the U.S. healthcare system.

QUOTE: A new report by KnujOn, an antispam company, and LegitScript, which verifies the legitimacy of particular online pharmacies... claims that 89.7 percent of the prescription drug and online pharmacy search ads reviewed on Microsoft's adCenter led to rogue Internet pharmacies.

QUOTE: Does my child really need drugs for ADHD, and if so, is there a point when he or she should stop taking them?...Because drug companies tend to give samples for only the most expensive drugs, once the samples run out, you'll end up paying more than if your child had been prescribed a generic drug.

QUOTE: as [medical marijuana] dispensaries have sprouted across this and other California cities, they face pushback from local residents unhappy with their new neighbors and officials concerned about inadequate oversight of a novel business.

QUOTE: At a time when terminally ill patients have more access to medical research than ever before, and perhaps a deeper conviction in its ability to cure them, many are campaigning for the chance to be treated with drugs whose safety and effectiveness is not yet known. But even as advances in areas like stem cells and genetics generate greater hope for experimental therapies, there is little consensus on how and when to provide them to dying patients whose lives could be prolonged, or shortened, by trying them.

QUOTE: experts and lawmakers are growing more and more concerned that the nation is far too reliant on medicine from abroad... “The lack of regulation around outsourcing is a blind spot that leaves room for supply disruptions, counterfeit medicines, even bioterrorism,” said Senator Sherrod Brown, Democrat of Ohio...

QUOTE: One of the nation's largest processors of pharmacy prescriptions said this week that extortionists are threatening to disclose personal and medical information about millions of Americans if the company fails to meet payment demands.

QUOTE: There is an ethical dilemma to consider about GH and the entire lifestyle drug market. Once a lifestyle drug is readily available and widely consumed, it can lead to a shift in what society considers normal. If height can be enhanced by "plastic endocrinologists" for the right price, we're redefining normal, and leaving those who can't afford these services behind.

QUOTE: Half of all American doctors responding to a nationwide survey say they regularly prescribe placebos to patients. The results trouble medical ethicists, who say more research is needed to determine whether doctors must deceive patients in order for placebos to work.

QUOTE: Off-label use accounts for somewhere between half and three-quarters of all medications used in children and is also commonly used for adult treatment. Pediatricians are often uncomfortable with this practice, but they consider it the lesser of two evils when confronting an illness with effective adult treatment but nothing for children. Most medications behave similarly in children and adults, but that rule has exceptions, as we sometimes discover too late.

QUOTE: In legal jargon, the cases concern “pre-emption,” a doctrine that can bar injured consumers like Ms. Levine from suing in state court when the products that hurt them had met federal standards. The issue is less boring and more consequential than it sounds, and Ms. Levine’s case is shaping up to be the most important business case of the term.

QUOTE: The Tour de France lost one of its top teams Thursday when Italian rider Riccardo Ricco tested positive for a new-generation variant of the blood-boosting drug EPO and his Saunier Duval-Scott team withdrew from the race. Ricco, the winner of two stages in the Tour’s first nine days and in ninth place in the race so far, tested positive after the fourth stage of the race last week, according to the French Anti-Doping Agency.

QUOTE: The FDA is requiring the label warnings and a medication guide for fluoroquinolone drugs, which include Cipro, Levaquin, Avelox, Noroxin and Floxin. The consumer group Public Citizen asked the FDA in August 2006 to put the "black box" warning on Cipro and other fluoroquinolones, and also to warn doctors. Earlier this year, Public Citizen filed a lawsuit to force the FDA to take those actions.

QUOTE: Medical marijuana was legalized under state law by California voters in 1996, and since then 11 other states have followed, even though federal law still bans the sale of any marijuana. But some frustrated residents and law enforcement officials say the California law has increasingly and unintentionally provided legal cover for large-scale marijuana growers — and the problems such big-money operations can attract.

QUOTE: "I didn’t think I would get into that much trouble, because I thought it was pretty apparent that the top people in the industry use steroids to look like we do.” A company whose products he endorsed, Iovate Health Sciences, apparently did not think so, and promptly severed Mr. Boeving’s contract.

QUOTE: The agency now relies on an unsystematic system in which doctors, patients and manufacturers report problems with drugs and medical devices when they deem them important. One doctor might see an infection following the use of a drug as important to report while another might not. The agency estimates that it receives reports for only a fraction of actual drug effects.

QUOTE: The U.S. government has injected hundreds of foreigners it has deported with dangerous psychotropic drugs against their will to keep them sedated during the trip back to their home country, according to medical records, internal documents and interviews with people who have been drugged.

QUOTE: The highly concentrated compound made from a kind of mint plant remains legal in all but eight states, available in smoke shops and even gas station mini-marts. It can also be obtained via the Internet. Its easy availability and disorienting properties come as a surprise to parents and many lawmakers, who are asking why the US government has not yet outlawed its sale.

QUOTE: The Defense Department and the CIA, the two agencies responsible for detaining terrorism suspects, both deny using drugs as an enhancement for interrogations, and suggest that the stories from Nusairi and others like him are either fabrications or mistaken interpretations of routine medical treatment. Yet the allegations have resurfaced because of the release this month of a 2003 Justice Department memo that explicitly condoned the use of drugs on detainees.

QUOTE: consumers and physicians are increasingly concerned as cost pressures push more patients away from brand-name drugs. At the same time, the globalization of pharmaceutical manufacturing has revealed regulatory lapses. By law, generics must have the same active ingredient and the same action as the brand-name version, which allows them to piggyback on the original safety and efficacy trials. But generics do have different inactive ingredients, which can affect how they are absorbed into the body.

QUOTE: The government of President Raúl Castro has lifted a ban on Cubans staying in hotels on the island, tourism industry employees said Monday, in an apparent end to a policy that exiled bloggers and other critics had dubbed "tourism apartheid."

QUOTE: In that sense, the dispute over Cerezyme could be a sign of the increased scrutiny that dosing will receive as drugs become more expensive. Pharmaceutical companies have faced complaints for years over prices, but now they might have to defuse efforts to use less of their drugs to cut costs, and to rebut accusations that doses are inflated to bolster profits.

QUOTE: ...an era of doping may be looming in academia, and it has ignited a debate about policy and ethics that in some ways echoes the national controversy over performance enhancement accusations against elite athletes like Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens.

QUOTE: be seen in a timely manner....test results in a timely manner...Your doctor -- not the staff -- should call you with bad results....Your doctor should tell you what medicines you're getting and their side effects....Your doctor should explain everything in terms you can understand

QUOTE: In addition to casting doubt on notions such as lowering cholesterol to prevent heart disease and normalizing blood sugar to protect diabetics, the studies...have also rekindled concern about whether new medications are being tested adequately before being allowed on the market.